I Wish I Was Always That Calm

I left D.C. mid-afternoon Friday, driving my rental car. I'd been there all week working on a project. It had been a week of long hours, and I was ready to get on home. It took me about 7-1/2 hours to drive down there last Sunday night but I knew this would be a longer drive, because I was leaving D.C. on a Friday afternoon. I think it took me two hours just to get past Baltimore and up to the Pennsylvania line, crawling most of the way. It was warm, about 70 degrees, and the trees down there are starting to leaf out. As soon as I got into PA, it started raining.

On and on across the high plateaus of the Keystone State in the rain. As darkness came on I was finally feeling the tug of home stronger than the push of D.C., barrelling past Homer, New York on I-81. It was after 10 PM, and I was bleary eyed, but the rain was stopping. I had some old-timey music turned up loud to stave off the boredom. At one point I was fidgeting with the CD player, not fully attentive to the road, and I looked up just as a I blew by a car parked on the shoulder. I only just caught the most brief of glimpses of this image due to my speed, inattentiveness, and fatigued condition. What my weary brain told me I saw, although I wasn't sure, was a girl in a long dress or coat, standing behind a vehicle, holding a sign with a flashlight shining on it. I thought I saw the word GAS.

I'm still zooming, my mind is running this scenario over, I'm thinking how badly I want to get home, but I think that was a pretty clear plea for help that I couldn't ignore. I hit the brakes. By the time I came to a stop I was a couple of thousand feet beyond her. Into reverse goes the car and I start backing up. That's never a good thing to do, especially on a rainy night. There happens to be a break in the traffic so I decide to get the backing up over with quickly, and I speed up. It's not easy to maintain a straight track going fast in reverse, so I'm swerving. I got back to the car, a mini-van, and put my car in park, not really sure what I was getting myself into. She probably wondered the same after observing my swerving approach. I see in my rear-view mirror a driver getting out of the car. I do the same and we meet between the vehicles, bathed in flashing red and amber light. It's a young man, tall, thin, bearded, glasses. I said, "you got some trouble?" He confirmed, in a most polite voice, that they thought they were out of gas, although they weren't sure because the gauge was broken. I said I didn't have a gas can, but I'd take them to find a gas station. We were close to the next exit, I figured it couldn't be that far. He said OK and headed back to his car. I started clearing out all of the clothes and CDs and food that was scattered in my car. He suddenly came back and said "Is it OK if my wife and young son come, too?" Of course, I say, we don't want to leave them on the side of the interstate alone.

It was then I finally got a closer look at the wife, who was carrying a baby totally wrapped in a blanket. And she was wearing a bonnet on her head, a la Amish or Mennonite. I realized that also matched his appearance, as he was wearing dark gray dress pants and coat, and black shoes. We pile into the car and we're off. We get off at the next exit, but it was bleak and dark and barren of anything at all. So I headed east, hoping I wasn't in for a long chase for fuel. But it gave me a chance to talk to them. They were from southern Pennsylvania, headed for a friend's wedding up near Lowville, New York. Their plan was to get a hotel room in Syracuse for the night. The van was a loaner from their church's pastor, with 200,000-plus miles on it, and he had warned them of the gas gauge. But the kid thought he was well within the distance the pastor had said they could go before needing to gas up again. After a few miles we came to a crossroads with a gas station, and were able to take care of business pretty quickly. While he was filling the gas can I talked to the girl a bit. I had noticed an accent when she first spoke, and it turned out she was Ukrainian. She had a beautful face, with huge cheekbones and perfect skin. Her expression, and her entire demeanor for that matter were completely devoid of concern with the night's turn of events. I still hadn't really seen the baby, as only the crown of its head showed outside the folds of the quilt. It could've been a doll for all I knew. She said it was a boy and he was eleven months old today. I asked if this was his first trip away from home and she said no, he'd already traveled to the Ukraine with them.

On the drive back to the van I told him I'd run out of gas many times in my younger years, having driven many a junker car. "But," I joked, " I don't think I ever did it with my wife and baby on board!" He chuckled, and then he said in a most reassured voice, "Well, I'm a Christian and I always believe the Lord will provide." A lot of people might say that's a naive outlook. My reply was "So am I and so do I."

It took a while to get the van to start, but start it did. I wished them luck the rest of the way and they showed real gratitiude for the help. They were about to take off ahead of me, when he came trotting back to my car, and in that polite voice, tried to offer me some money. I said thank you, but I'm sure the Lord will provide for me.